Package Bomb Found at Greek Embassy in Rome

Bomb squad experts defused a package bomb that was delivered to the Greek Embassy in Rome on Monday, four days after similar mail bombs exploded at two other embassies, wounding two people.
Carabinieri Col. Maurizio Mezzavilla said the bomb was similar to the ones that exploded Thursday at the Chilean and Swiss embassies. An anarchist group with reported ties to Greek anarchists claimed responsibility for those blasts.
“Having been done in the same way, we can just hypothesize that there is the same hand behind it,” Greek Ambassador Michalis Kambanis said at the embassy, although he added that he knew of no specific claim of responsibility.
Greek Foreign Ministry spokesman Gregoris Delavekouras said from Athens that no one was harmed in the latest incident, in part because heightened security measures had already been put in place.
“The embassy was evacuated and the staff assembled some distance away from the building, so that everyone could be accounted for,” he told The Associated Press.
“There were already heightened security measures at the Greek and other embassies, so the procedure that had to be followed was clear.”
Police, carabinieri and firefighters massed around the building Monday while the Greek Embassy staff lingered outside. The street, in the residential Parioli neighborhood, remained open to traffic.
Ambassador Kambanis said the package, hand addressed to the embassy, was discovered at about 10:30 a.m.